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"If you're lying, your boyfriend goes up in Amaterasu." Itachi leaned on the door, face strained. He didn't look very threatening, but no one put it past him.

Older Sakura and Izumi ran to Sasuke's older brother and sat him down on the couch. "Are you okay, Itachi-san?!" Older Sakura asked. "Do you want water? Soup? Dango?"

"Tea would be nice." Itachi smiled wearily. "Thank you, Sakura-chan."

Sakura nodded, smiled, and left the room to make him his tea. Younger Sasuke was overjoyed that his brother was awake, but he sat still, waiting for Itachi to address him.

"Itachi-kun!" Izumi squealed, tears coming to her eyes. He enveloped her in a hug and smiled.

"Where's Shisui?" He asked the Sasukes. Older Sasuke shrugged, rolling his eyes. Who cares where that guy is? Itachi's alive.

"Somewhere with Pervy Sage." Older Naruto shrugged in response, not really knowing either. "I almost didn't let Shisui go with him, but you Uchihas are all so stubborn."

"So... outside or in the training room, probably." Sasuke said. "How are you feeling, nii-san?"

"Better." Was his reply. His onyx eyes landed on his niece, and he gestured for her to come over. Boruto lightly shoved her shoulder, and the Sasukes and Narutos in the room turned to him with fire in their eyes. He chuckled nervously and hid behind Younger Hinata and Younger Sakura. Older Hinata had gone to help Older Sakura. Sarada swallowed nervously and smiled a little, walking over to Itachi and stopping in front of him.

"H-hi, Itachi-jii..." She smiled wider, just happy that Itachi was alive, and seemed to be in a stable condition. "I'm glad to see you're doing better, huh?" She said politely.

Itachi grabbed her hand and pulled her into a giant hug. Sarada hugged back, letting tears slip down her cheeks.

"You scared me." Sarada whispered into his shirt, squeezing him tighter. "So, so badly, I had to turn to the dobe for comfort."

Itachi chuckled, the happy laugh resonating from deep in his chest. "Thank you, Sarada... You saved me." He sat her down in his place on the couch, standing up hesitantly. Sarada was confused, but stayed on the couch.

Itachi smiled, exhaled loudly, then dropped to his knees, planting his face on the floor. The great Itachi Uchiha was bowing... to her. Then Older Sasuke stood up and followed suit, not really knowing what exactly his daughter had done, but it had clearly moved Itachi. He was immensely proud, and all around pleased.

Older Naruto just followed Sasuke-teme's lead and bowed to Sarada as well. Sarada stood up quickly, jaw dropping in awe. The Hokage was bowing to her. Something about that seemed fundamentally wrong. She stuttered and shook her head multiple times, gesturing for him to get up again and again. Naruto just gave her a grin from the floor. Izumi smiled, stood, and did the same as the boys, prompting Younger Naruto and Sasuke to do the same. Sarada was about to cry, because it was entirely uncalled for and it seemed pretty wrong.

Mitsuki followed soon after that. Boruto groaned, but Older Naruto pulled him onto the floor, so he ended up bowing to Sarada as well. Sarada smirked in satisfaction at her teammates, before going back to glaring at literally everyone. Boruto winced on the floor.

"Just so we're clear," he whispered to Mitsuki, who was faceplanted beside him, "This does NOT get out at home, got it?"

"Okay, whatever you say, Boruto." Mitsuki said, a smug grin on his face. Now he had something to hold over the Hokage's son as blackmail. He and Sarada enjoyed watching him squirm under pressure, and now they'd get more chances to do that. "Now shut up."

Boruto mumbled, but noticed that things were happening that were more important than his reputation. (HAH. Wish this was real...)

Sarada looked down, her hair that was no longer held back by the Konoha headband falling in her face, but Boruto could clearly see her shaking shoulders and the tears dripping onto her hoodie. Itachi noticed too, apparently, because he stood up and hugged her tightly.

"I didn't do anything, Uncle Itachi..." Sarada muttered into his gray shirt. "You're so embarrassing."

"Come on. You were there for me even when I was in a coma, Sarada." Itachi stroked her hair, wiggling his eyebrows at Older Sasuke. This is what it feels like to be an embarrassing uncle. I enjoy it. Sasuke just shook his head in amusement. "And that means more to me than anything you could've done. The reason I'm still here is because of you, ne? Don't tell me you didn't do anything."

Sarada sighed, dried her tears, and looked at the still-bowing room. "You can all stand up. I don't know why you're bowing anyway, but arigato." She glared at her uncle, before sitting back down on the floor in front of a couch, and sighing.

Boruto sighed and stood up, dusting his pants off. Everyone else slowly got up, Naruto muttering about his kid's 'horrible manners' and 'what did Hinata teach him? Himawari is so much better educated than him, apparently'.

Sarada and Boruto exchanged glances, each rolling their eyes at the exact same time, small smiles on their faces.

"ANNOOOO, WHO WANTS TEA?!" Sakura hollered. The girls came from the kitchen, Sakura balancing a tray in her palm with Hinata following her. Hinata held the tray normally, obviously scared she would drop it. "Hey... What did we miss?" Sakura asked, confused.

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"Hey."

Boruto looked up at the smooth voice. He was sitting alone, minding his own business. The house was so crowded, that he couldn't hear himself think. He had slipped away to get some alone time, but it appeared someone had found him anyway. It was...

"Uncle Sasuke?"

Sasuke sighed. He liked the kid, when he wasn't annoying like his father. He was like Naruto when the Dobe was little, which means he had Naruto's stubborness, Will of Fire, and every other good quality. But then again... he'd also been left with all the bad qualities as well.

"WHERE HAVE YOU BEEN, UNCLE SASUKE?!? DO YOU REALIZE HOW MUCH DANGER SARADA WAS IN!?!"

He was still a bossy, spoiled brat. UNlike Naruto.

"Where do you think?!" Sasuke groaned. "Looking for you idiot who somehow manage to find, open, and read a Time Travel Jutsu scroll! Do you have ANY IDEA how much time it took to find that?! Thanks, little jerk. Another 5 months of my life away from Konoha wasted." Sasuke had found that on a mission in the Land of Iron, when he was looking for information about some little statues that depicted Kaguya Ōtsutsuki.

"Are you calling Sarada an idiot?!" Boruto asked.

"Of course not. Tell me, Boruto, who STOLE the scroll?"

"... me...?"

"Who OPENED the scroll?"

"Me."

"Who LOST the scroll?"

"Me."

"Who tried to stop you?"

"Sarada..."

"Exactly." Sasuke hissed. "My daughter is smart. Smarter than you, clearly. She's also strong. Clearly she has more common sense than you, so I never for a second thought that my daughter was the one that got you two into this mess."

"I know!" Boruto sighed. "Sarada's awesome. She's smart. She was the voice of reason that I didn't listen to in the moment. Whatever."

"Remind me to talk to you about the crush you seem to have on my daughter later, hm?" Sasuke said, sending the boy a piercing glare. He recognized that attitude from when the Older Dobe, Naruto, had always come to him bitching and moaning about how he loved Hinata. Of course, Boruto and Naruto were quite different in some areas. Being the boy's teacher, Sasuke had been bound to learn that. However, this, he legitimately thought was a similarity they shared.

He thought this even more when he saw the blonde's reaction. Boruto nervously nodded, stammering, "H-hai, Uncle Sasuke." Translation: No way in heck am I reminding you, Uncle Sasuke.

"Listen up, boy, it's either me or Sakura. Which one do you think would let you off lighter?"

"... Aunt Sakura?"

"Aunt Sakura." Sasuke affirmed. "But I'm not giving you that chance. It's either you stop lying to me, or I tell Sakura to pound you into the ground. You know she would do it if I told her to." One of the pros of being married to the strongest woman in the world. He'd need a damned good reason to get his wife to beat up this brat, and 'he likes Sarada!' isn't going to cut it.

Not that Boruto needed to know that.

Boruto gulped.

"And if she doesn't want to, than I'll get Itachi to help me. Have you ever been stuck in a Tsukuyomi, Boruto?" Sasuke asked, a wicked look coming onto his face. Itachi might be more willing to help- though he'd never in a million years use his torture realm on the kid.

"What's that?" Boruto asked. It sounded familiar, and he suspected that he'd learned about it, but he couldn't remember anything with Uncle Sasuke threatening him.

"I thought not. Your generation is soft. What are they teaching at the Academy these days... anyway, Itachi can put you under one of those. You won't like how it feels. At all. His genjutsus have crippled not only me, but Kakashi-sensei, Naruto, Kurenai Sarutobi, Kabuto, even Orochimaru, and some of the strongest people alive today have been stuck or tricked by his jutsu. It's not fun. And he would be more than willing to do something like that for his niece, don't you think?" Maybe. It was something Sasuke would need to discuss with him at a later time.

Boruto chewed on his lip nervously. "Should I go write my will?"

"I think it would be a good idea." Sasuke nodded. "Everything that's happened now happened because of you, anyway."

Boruto inwardly cursed his sensei for knowing everything, but outwardly, kept an ashamed face on. "Sorry, Uncle Sasuke."

"You dāmn better be. Sarada's on your genin team- I can't trust you if I don't know that you won't get her and Mitsuki into some kind of trouble like this." Sasuke scowled, then his gaze softened. "But because of you, my brother is alive now. He has a chance to have a future. A family. So for that," Sasuke knelt down and poked Boruto in the forehead using two fingers. "Uzumaki Boruto, thank you."

And then Boruto woke up.

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"Are they still here?" A deep voice asked.

"No," Another replied. "I can't imagine how they seem to have forgotten that some of us have special abilities that keep us alive and well, un..." The voice chuckled. "Well, not me. I just got lucky. But you guys know what I mean."

"They didn't forget." Someone else scowled. "The older Sasuke has the Rinnegan and Eternal Mangekyo Sharingan. I saw it. He was fully aware that they weren't killing us. And I suspect the Hyuuga girl and the other woman... Haruno Sakura I think her name was... knew that they weren't killing us."

"The Jinchuriki probably didn't." The first one chuckled. "He's fūcking dense..."

"Why are we in one of Orochimaru's hideouts?!" The second one asked. "That's, like, an Akatsuki all-time-low, un."

"Deidara, we're lying low until we're certain that the future people are gone." Someone else explained patiently. "We're leaving here as soon as possible."

"Well Zetsu sure is taking his time..." Deidara muttered angrily. "When is he coming back?"

"How should we know?!" One of the others scowled. "Just shut up and let me go to sleep." He let out a string of curses.

"You shut up, Hidan! I am soooo bored. AND I'm out of clay. What am I supposed to do now?!"

"Shut up, is what! Now do that!"

"Come on..." Deidara muttered.

"Deidara, how much time have you been spending around Tobi?" The second voice said. "You're starting to act like him."

"SHUT UP, KISAME! I'M NOTHING LIKE TOBI!" Deidara protested, sitting down on the medical table and swinging his legs as Kisame went through all the jars in the room.

"Mmm hmm." Kisame muttered. "Tell that to Leader-sama."

Pein looked up from helping Konan bandage his waist. Naruto's Rasengan had messed him up pretty badly, and he was having a hard time being his usual bossy self. "Tell me what?"

"Nothing," Deidara said quickly. "Go back to healing, Leader-sama."

"Are we still calling him Leader?" Hidan asked lazily from where he was laying on the floor staring up at the ceiling. "Because we all know that Madara is in charge here."

Madara, who was sitting in the corner, watching all of this with an apathetic expression, raised his head. "Call him what you like. Just stay out of my way."

Hidan frowned at the orange mask. "No way this dude used to be Tobi..."

"That doesn't matter now." Madara growled. "What matters is capturing one of the people from the future and actually GETTING something from them. And hopefully we still have... well, you know who."

The Akatsuki went silent. The Sarada incident wasn't pleasant to talk about.

"Hey." Zetsu's strange body began to peek out of the walls. "All clear." Black Zetsu said. "Let's get out of here. This place gives me the hiiby jiibies."

"No need to be so rude!" White Zetsu scolded his other side. "As he said, however, it seems to have been cleared for awhile now. For some reason time seems to slow down around here."

"I see." Madara laughed. "Another jutsu Orochimaru learned. Let's go. We'll regroup and plan another attack right away. We can't give them time to escape. They'll want to go back to the future soon."

"So is this kind of like the Jinchuriki-kidnapping thing?" Deidara asked boredly.

"Yes, in a way." Madara said. "We want the future people, but also get their younger selves. You know, just in case."

"Okay..." Kisame smirked, a grin spreading over his face, making his pearly white shark teeth visible. "This'll be fun."

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"So," Sarada said, wrapping her arms around Itachi's neck from behind the couch. "How are you feeling, Itachi-jii?" Sakura smiled, enjoying the niece/uncle moment the two were having, and getting excited. Surely the future will have changed, since Sasuke-kun had his arm back now, so Itachi-san would be alive in the future.

Sarada would have a better life. When her father wasn't there, her uncle was. That would be nice. And maybe Sarada never would've questioned her kinship to Sakura if Itachi were around. He would explain it to her better than Sakura could.

Sakura loved the changes she could see in Itachi. What she remembered about him at this age was a twenty-one year old boy being used as a weapon, but younger Sakura thought he was a murderer, and was fully prepared to help Sasuke find him. When they truth came out, Sakura locked herself in her room, rethinking all of her life choices.

Everything she'd done, everything she'd thought was based on the solid truth that Itachi was the bad guy here, and for no one else it was as certain. If he was Sasuke-kun's enemy, he was hers. And then when it turned out that Itachi was the good guy, her world was flipped upside down.

Why would he do such a thing for his village? The people in Konoha aren't his family, they aren't flesh and blood, they're strangers. Itachi killed his family, his clan, for Konoha.

If anyone was a hero, it was Itachi.

If anyone deserved a family, it was him.

If anyone should be recognized, it was Itachi.

And Sakura was going to make sure, now that Itachi is alive, that he was going to have a family, and he was going to relax for a good ten years. He needed it.

But for now, they needed to prepare to go home.